Help Me fix this fragment!!?

Question

Their plan eventually comes to a halt, and not only leads to the demise of Dimmesdale but also his death.

Answer 1

"Their plan eventually comes to a halt, which not only leads to the demise of Dimmesdale, but also to his death."

If you're writing an essay and need more help, email me!

---P.S. Now that I know that "his" refers to Dimmesdale, this is how I'd change that sentence: "Their plan eventually comes to a halt, which leads to the eventual death of Dimmesdale."

Answer 2

It's not a fragment; it's a complete sentence, but it has a problem in parallel structure. Here's what I'd do with it:

Their plan eventually comes to a halt, and leads not only to the demise of Dimmesdale but also to his death.

"Not only" and "but also" are correlatives, like "either" and "or," and they require the same type of grammatical construction after each. In this case, I revised the sentence so that each one is followed by a prepostional phrase.

Now, you don't really need that comma after "halt." The word "and," which it precedes, links two verbs, not two independent clauses. Once you've made the first revision, you'll probably feel freer to let the comma go.

Finally, "demise" is just a fancy word for "death." To keep your "not only . . . but also" construction, you'll need a different word. "Downfall"? "Disgrace"? "Exposure"?

Answer 3

It's not a sentence fragment at all, it's simply an awkward sentence. "Demise" and "death" mean the same thing, so you need to leave one of them out. If you both use "demise" and "death," you're effectively saying that it "leads to his death, and also his death," which doesn't make a lot of sense. I'd say something like, "Their plan eventually comes to a halt when it ends in the demise of Dimmesdale."

Answer 4

Aha! The Scarlet letter . You need a "to" on front of "his". However . . .how can a plan that is halted lead to anything???

Answer 5

comma after Dimmesdale, otherwise it's ok (has both a subject [plan] and verb [comes])